recently, the script received the new york film critics circle award, one of what will doubtless be many honors. tony first came to most people's attention with the epic play "angels in america," a devastating account of the a.i.d.s. epidemic while it was at its worst. tony received both a tony award and the pulitzer prize for drama as well as a primetime emmy award for its television adaptation on hbo. that was some 20 years ago. in the years since, tony's reputation as one of our most accomplished and sometimes controversial modern play writes has only grown. welcome. >> thank you. >> you said you worked six years. how did you go about the research? >> i just started reading. we started with doris' book. i was curious to read it. it's a great read and a great book, but it's the definition of a thing that can turn into a 2 1/2 hour script. i knew immediately from what i had read there was going to be too much material if we tried to cover the whole thing and the civil war as well. we would do one of those horrible things that's like all the high points. he does this. he delivers the get